


Where The Road Ends

by Destina



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-08
Updated: 2010-07-08
Packaged: 2018-02-23 11:28:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2545901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Destina/pseuds/Destina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-apocalypse, Sam and Dean find themselves wrapped up in each other, and with no particular place to go. Not at all canon compliant with season 5.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Where The Road Ends

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to LJ in 2010. In the wake of season five (which this story pretty much totally ignores), I found myself thinking all the time about happy endings. So here is one. With thanks to Em Brunson and Girlguidejones for their input, early on. Very tiny crossover with _The House With A Clock In Its Walls_ by John Bellairs - most of you won't even notice it.

On a frosty Thursday morning, Sam and Dean cast Lucifer back into the pit (with a little help from a few dozen angels and a hunter or two) and stood there, shoulder to shoulder, covered in blood and staring in disbelief as the pivotal battle of the universe ended with a literal whimper - Dean's. Sam reached out and curled his fingers loose around Dean's wrist, the rapid tap of Dean's pulse reassuring against Sam's fingertips, and held on until the light disappeared. 

Dean wiped his face with his sleeve, leaving an uneven smear of mud where blood had been, and said, "Well, cross that off the list." 

The words were so familiar, so full of bittersweet memory, that Sam turned to Dean and threw his arms around him, buried his face in Dean's neck and held on. There had been so few victories, and they always came at such a cost. 

Slowly, Dean's arms came up around him, and Sam proceeded to leave snot and tears all over Dean's neck and collar. 

Dean didn't seem to mind. Later, Sam found a suspicious smear or two on his own grimy shirt. 

The week-long bacchanal that followed migrated a couple of states as it progressed and ended up at Bobby's somehow. Sam was happy drunk most of the time, dizzy with relief and possibility. They could do anything, now, be anything. They were free. He slouched in the passenger seat, cheek against the smoothly worn leather of the seat, and stared at Dean, drank him in while Dean sang bad hair metal at the top of his lungs and pushed his baby as hard as she could go. 

He looked at Dean, and thought maybe he might touch him now, maybe he'd put his hands all over him. Maybe Dean would let him now, finally, because they were free. He laughed a little and pressed his face into the cool seat, closed his eyes against the swooping feeling in his chest when Dean said, "What the hell's so funny?"

"Everything," Sam mumbled, and promptly passed out. 

Hunters milled in and out at Bobby's for days, shaking hands and telling war stories, honoring their dead. Dean and Sam hovered at the periphery, mostly. It had been too long since they were welcome, and they were used to each other's company, anyway. The adrenaline high wore off, leaving Sam tired enough to sleep in between polishing off bottles of booze. Dean drove off one night and brought Sam back a random gift basket from a shop in town. He delivered it to Sam with a flourish, then laughed his ass off while a drunken Sam tore off the 'congratulations on your new baby!' tag and pawed the cellophane off to get to the goodies. They ate bananas and pears and chocolate, grinning at each other and washing it all down with beer and Jack, and it was good. 

On the eighth day, they stared at each other over banana peels and a pile of empty bottles, wondering what came next. 

Sam knew, of course. The business between them was long past settled, and they were wired a certain way, conditioned to get back in the car and drive, on to the next hunt, the next challenge. At least until they could figure out what passed for normal, now. And that was where the trouble started. 

Dean kept up a constant harangue about getting jobs and settling down, but he didn't mean himself. He meant Sam. Even now, after all the shit they'd flung at each other, the apologies rendered in blood, the separation and anxiety and navigating each other as grown-ups - he still thought Sam was different somehow, that he could fit in somewhere outside the circle drawn by Dean's grin and the closed door of the Impala and Sam's favorite shotgun in the trunk. Nowadays Dean seemed to believe the map in Sam's lap led to doors only Sam should be allowed to open. Sam thought there might still be a different map with Dean's name on it, one stained with blood, leading to places Sam couldn't follow. It was his job to burn that map for good. 

It all came to a head in a scene repeated so often, Sam could recite it by heart. Dean sat there in a random motel room eating a burger, spouting off the same tired roster of post-Armageddon activities for Sam. Grease dripped down his chin, and his left leg jiggled independently under the table, as if it wanted to ditch this lame-ass conversation and hit the road. 

That's how it came to pass that on a Tuesday, two weeks after the Winchesters vanquished Satan, Sam made his choice. 

"So, Sammy, what about becoming a high school counselor, huh? Put a few girls on the couch, peek inside their heads, look at their dirty laundry." Dean smirked in that grotesque way that made whatever was in his mouth clearly visible, and Sam had never been so disgusted, and had never loved Dean quite so much in his entire life. 

"You know what, Dean? Shut up." Sam slammed the gun oil and the cloth down on the other side of the table and stood up. "Shut the fuck up, all right? No more crap about adult education and late in life degrees and marriage and jobs. I don't ever want to hear about it again. Just shut up about it. All right? Okay?"

Dean chewed and swallowed carefully, like he had the tip of a knife stuck in his throat and had to move his food very precisely around it, and took a sip of beer while he looked Sam up and down. "That's a goddamned mouthful, Sammy." 

Sam stood there a second in disbelief, not really able to take that I-can-still-beat-your-ass tone in Dean's voice seriously anymore, and then he said, "Really, Dean? You called it years ago. This is what our life is, now, and that's okay. And we're not talking about this again."

Over the years, he'd told Dean a thousand times that he didn't want normal anymore, but it wasn't true. Normal had shifted location and definition, and now it had a name and a place and a purpose, and it was Sam's for the taking, and he wasn't letting go of it, ever. He'd fought too hard for his place beside Dean. 

Dean nodded, eyes narrowed, and that was it, that skeptical look was too much for Sam, not after everything. They'd been through too much, sacrificed too much, to bother pretending now. Even before he knew he meant to do it, Sam was moving, a clear picture of how he was going to convince Dean taking shape in his head. Sam kicked the table out of the way, pausing a second to gloat at the startled look on Dean's face, and then he cupped Dean's face in his hands and kissed him until the chair tipped over and they both landed on the floor. 

Two destroyed shirts, one broken bed, and a shattered mirror later, Dean lifted a hand weakly, then let it flop back down on Sam's bare shoulder near one of the many bite marks Sam was going to be wearing for weeks. Sam lifted his head and took in the whole sordid, beautiful display: Dean, covered in bruises and come, his lips a little bruised, a shred of his briefs still clinging to his ankle, was staring at Sam in a dazed way Sam found hilarious. Even as Sam grinned back, Dean flapped his hand once more, as if eloquence was about to descend on him any second. Sam turned on his side, caught Dean's hand and pulled, and Dean went into his arms pliantly, a couple hundred pounds of worn-out, snuggle-resistant brother. 

Sam slid his fingers through Dean's hair and occupied Dean's lips for a good thirty seconds -- deep, dirty kissing, with his other hand on Dean's ass. He wanted Dean, in a bone-deep, sure way he'd never wanted anything before; the weight and feel of Dean's body against him, Dean's skin and muscle under his hands, made him crazy. Dean shifted, pressed closer to him, and that was fine with Sam, because he was pretty sure they could never be close enough. Maybe he'd wanted him for years. There had always been something, but they couldn't let it be, couldn't look it in the eye. 

Now they could, though. Now there was nothing left standing in their way. 

He let Dean go and sat up, in case Dean wanted to put an inch or two of space between them, like there was any point anymore. But it didn't happen that way. Dean was watching him again, his expression complicated, hope and worry and glimpses of joy, tiny messages Sam had been born to read. He danced a finger idly across Dean's hand, while Dean fidgeted and pretended not to notice Sam was threading their fingers together. 

Sam poked him in the ankle with his big toe. "Are you going to freak out about this? Because if so, don't share. I'm over it." 

"I'm good," was all Dean said, in a weirdly soft tone of voice. 

Sam nodded. He sat there on the bed they'd just destroyed, holding Dean's hand and thinking about how he'd just had the best sex of his life with his brother. Which, considered that they'd just vanquished Lucifer, were BFFs with angels, had died a few times each, and had both started and ended the apocalypse, didn't really rate as even remotely surprising anymore. They'd been living in each other's pockets always, even when they were apart. Probably this was always how it was going to end up. 

Then he mused a while about how weird it was that he wasn't freaking out, and what a freak-out from Dean was going to look like, and whether his dick was going to be too sore to try out some new things on Dean in the morning. 

"Maybe after breakfast," he said out loud. 

"Pancakes," Dean said sleepily. He released Sam's hand slowly, then slid into Sam's lap so smoothly Sam blinked in surprise. Dean straddled Sam's legs, pushed his hair out of his face, and kissed him, slow and deliberate, finding all Sam's buttons with such erotic precision that Sam felt like he was being turned inside out, every ridiculous tender protective feeling he'd ever had for Dean vulnerably on display. He closed his eyes, let his hands fall to Dean's hips, then travel slowly up Dean's back, tracing the story written in Dean's skin, each mark a memory. 

Dean put his hands on Sam's chest and pushed him away. Then he flopped over on his stomach, throwing an arm across Sam's side. "Bacon. In the morning, I mean. Then sex." 

Sam sighed, more than a little lovesick, and said, "Is food all you can think about? Even at a time like this?"

"Time like what? You're over it, right? So shut up, I'm sleeping," Dean said, somewhat muffled by his pillow. Less than minute later, he was snoring gently. 

Sam was awake a long time, watching Dean settle into sleep until his self-conscious awareness of his naked brother faded into background noise. 

When he woke up in the morning, his head was on Dean's stomach, where a wild animal was screaming to be fed. Dean lurched out of bed, muttered something about hating mornings, brushed his teeth and gargled, and bitched about there being no glasses by the sink. Sam held his breath, waiting for Dean to turn around and say he was leaving, tell Sam to get out, ask Sam how long he'd been thinking about doing perverted things to his brother, ask him to go his own way now that the apocalypse was averted -- but none of that happened. 

Instead, Dean turned his head, winked at him, and slammed the bathroom door behind him. And then through the sounds of the shower, Sam heard Dean whistling Zeppelin. Off-key. 

It was status quo, perfectly Dean, an ease of familiarity Sam had been waiting for. The band of stress and fear Sam hadn't even realized was choking him eased, then vanished, as if it had never been there at all. He buried his sappy smile in the pillow, because no human being could possibly be as happy as he was at that moment and be expected not to smile. 

Dean emerged whistling from the shower with a towel over his head. He took one look at Sam's face and rolled his eyes. Then he got back in bed, draped himself across Sam's back, and whispered into his ear: "Pancakes, bitch!" 

The warm huff of his laugh in Sam's ear was the best thing Sam had ever heard. 

**

Days bled into weeks on the road, the jobs coming quickly now that basic supernatural weirdness could take precedence over demons again. A simple haunting in southern Montana led to Sam and Dean eating moist chocolate cake at an elderly widow's table and listening to her stories about the husband they'd just salted and burned. 

"Not the same here since my Will is gone," she said, eyes cast down at her green-and-blue checked tablecloth. "Can't keep the place up like I should."

Sam looked at Dean, who was licking chocolate frosting off his fork. Dean nodded, ever so slightly, so Sam said, "Mrs. Dixon, we could probably help out some, before we get back on the road." 

"Oh, boys, could you?" She sank down in the chair, a look of such profound gratitude on her face, Sam felt embarrassed for not offering sooner. "There's a converted barn out on the property, so you could stay there, if you like. It needs fixing up, but you could have your privacy." 

Dean cleared his throat and put the fork down, and the mischief dancing in his eyes made Sam say quickly, "That'd be fine, Mrs. Dixon."

"Georgia," she corrected him, pushing the cake plate toward him. 

The converted barn was perfect - bedroom, living room with fireplace, bathroom and kitchenette - nicer than 90% of the dives they'd slept in the past six years. They shoved the ancient twin beds together and made them up with sleeping bags. That night, Dean accidentally fucked Sam right down into the crack and could not stop laughing when the beds separated and Sam went face-first onto the floor. 

"Seriously, who gets a facial injury from fucking?" Sam asked, looking at his broken nose in the mirror the next morning. 

Dean stood beside him and examined his face critically before he helped maneuver the cartilage back where it was more or less straight. Then, with a smirk, he said, "You said facial," and backed out of the bathroom fast, before Sam could strangle him with a towel. 

That afternoon, Dean welded the iron bedframes together. Sam stood in the doorway and watched the sparks fly up and die as the two pieces fused into one permanent whole. 

A week's stay at the farm became a month, and the work around Georgia's place wasn't finished, so they started leaving a week or two at a time to take hunts elsewhere. Sam started thinking of the puke-green barn as home base, though he didn't mention that to Dean, because if he did, they'd never be back. Dean was still allergic to staying put. Instead he sat on the porch, drinking a beer and listening to Dean hammering boards on the side of the barn and cursing a blue streak, and let a bone-deep contentment radiate through him. 

Bobby stopped by on his way through to a hunt in Texas. He stood leaning on his car, arms folded, looking up at the barn with faint horror. "You boys actually live in that thing?" 

Sam turned and looked up at the hole in the roof he'd just been patching, and the broken window Dean had sealed with duct tape early on, and the rickety chairs on the porch. Rickety, sure, but he'd stopped noticing weeks ago. It didn't *feel* rickety. It felt like toast in the morning and Dean's soft breath on his neck at night, his warm body next to Sam, safe and home and everything else Dean was probably just about to crack a joke about. 

"Sure do," he said quietly. 

Dean, who was finishing up something under the hood of the Impala, stilled. He looked back over his shoulder at Sam, and held his gaze for a long moment. Then he turned his head away, wiped his left hand on his jeans, and picked up the wrench again. 

Bobby cleared his throat. "You gonna cough up a beer, or do I have to go beggin' over at the widow's house?"

"Probably do you some good," Dean said from under the hood. "Get a little nookie with your beer, am I right?" 

"Dean!" Sam said, wincing a little at the cascade of mental images.

Bobby guffawed and fished out a beer from the cooler and chuckled around his first sip. "Need to know what she looks like, first," he said out of the side of his mouth to Sam, and chuckled some more. 

Ellen stopped by every so often too, with Jo, and sometimes there were more people in the house than there was floor space. Sam cooked meals that resembled burned diner fare, or tried to anyway, until Dean pushed him aside and took over, producing roast beef that wasn't charred and a vegetable or two that might hold up if speared with a fork. They bitched at each other over the dishes, the leftovers, even the consistency of Sam's scrambled eggs, which were the one thing he could reliably cook. 

"Do you boys ever go a day without fighting?" Ellen asked once, exasperated. 

It occurred to Sam then that even though everything had changed between them, no one could see it as it was because it had always been this way, just exactly this way, the two of them fighting and bickering and hating each other's guts every now and then. 

"The make-up sex is good," Dean said, winking at Ellen. 

Sam startled and dropped a roasting pan on the floor, where it clattered and banged and rolled for a few seconds before he could grab it. The part of him that was still John Winchester's youngest kid curled up in shame at the idea all John's friends might look at them and know his boys were doing the nasty in the dark when no one else was around. He sneaked a peek at Ellen, but she only rolled her eyes and patted Dean on the ass fondly. Jo just ignored him. 

When Sam turned an accusing look on Dean, his brother at least had the good grace to look apologetic. Sam knew they were hiding in plain sight, which meant no hiding at all, but it was going to take some getting used to. 

That night Sam held his hand over Dean's mouth and went down on him, slowly. He stretched it out for hours, licking and sucking until Dean was arched off the bed. He took vicious satisfaction in pulling Dean's hands away from where they twisted the sheets in frustration, and forced him to endure coming in total silence as payback. It was only fair. 

**

After a year or two, Georgia made their informal arrangement formal and asked them to stay on for good, which gave her adult kids some peace of mind, knowing she wasn't alone on the place. Sam wanted to agree right away, but Dean required some convincing. He paced the living room and tossed back beer after beer, shooting down all Sam's persuasive arguments. 

"Come on, Sam, I thought you didn't want to settle down. You told me we were never talking about it again. Right?" 

"Seriously, Dean?" Sam threw his arms out, encompassing the entirety of their tiny home. "We've lived here for two years, give or take a couple months. You've rebuilt practically the whole house. There are flowers beside the front steps. Dude, we couldn't be any more domestic if you were a girl." 

"You're the girl," Dean shot back. "A big, gigantic girl." 

"Right." Sam narrowed his eyes. "And you didn't just start building us a bed out of new lumber two days ago." 

Dean flushed crimson. "Been breaking my back on that goddamned torture rack for two years. I had to do something." 

Sam rolled his eyes. "Admit it, Dean. You're happy here. Why can't you just admit it?" 

Dean picked up his jacket and keys and pushed past Sam. "I'm going into town for a drink. Don't wait up." 

"Whatever," Sam shouted after him. 

It was a miserable night. 

The first few hours, Sam sat at the tiny kitchen table and scowled down at the research he'd been doing, but the anger twisted itself into a knot of guilt and worry before long. He'd known, when he pushed the subject, that it might send Dean running. Dean could live with what they were, what they'd become, as long as he didn't have to acknowledge it outright. Sam had forced him to see it anyway. 

He mainlined coffee, sat and stared into the fireplace until late in the night, rain rattling on the roof, but Dean didn't show. The bed was hard and uncomfortable and empty, and for the first time, Sam stared into the dark and thought about how it had been without Dean not so long ago when they were separate and alone. The world had seemed so narrow then, confined to the few spaces that didn't remind him of what he was without. He could do it again, if he had to. If he had to. 

The image of Dean driving down the road alone was the last thought in his head before he drifted off to sleep. 

Sometime around dawn, Sam woke to the sound of the floorboards creaking. Sam rolled over and watched, instantly wide awake, as Dean threw off his jacket and undressed without once looking at Sam. He sat down on the edge of the bed, back to Sam. 

"Dean?"

"You never did get it." Dean rubbed a hand over his face. "Not when you were young, and not now. The barn doesn't fucking matter, Sam."

"You're wrong, Dean. I always knew. Home was never about the goddamned motels or the rentals. I just never understood how important it was going to be to me, someday." 

Dean swung his legs up and slid under the sheet, then turned to face Sam. "It makes me want to get in the car and drive until the road runs out, Sam, I'm not kidding." 

"You're free," Sam said, swallowing. "You can go anytime you want. You-"

"That's just it," Dean said. "I can't. Not without you." 

Sam moved closer, until they were touching down the length of their bodies, and then he kissed Dean, one hand on the small of his back. Dean's hand drifted automatically to Sam's skin, to his back, and the scar there Dean could never stop touching. "If you want to go, then we go," Sam said. 

Immediately the tension drained out of Dean's body. "If you want to stay, then we stay," he countered. 

"Only if you finish the bed." 

Dean chuckled, and tangled his legs with Sam's, and so it was settled. 

**

It was Bobby who started sending business their way. At first it was just a hunter or two looking for particular kinds of knives, or weapons, or hex bags, or charms, the sort of thing the Winchesters had a surplus of. Sam had a talent for finding blades, whereas Dean could take any firearm apart and put it together in working order. 

The trickle of hunters became a steady stream, and after a couple years of it, they were on the speed-dial of just about every competent hunter still on the prowl. Sam took to sleeping with his cell phone under his pillow on vibrate, where early morning requests for information would tickle his fingers. He'd roll out of bed whispering answers and head for the kitchen to start the coffee. Eventually, the scent of liquid heaven would lure Dean out as well. 

"Who was it?" Dean asked one chilly winter morning, like he always did. He draped himself unexpectedly around Sam, warm and comfortable, and sighed in Sam's ear, which made Sam shiver. 

"Lewis Barnavelt. Needs an incantation, old magic." Sam leaned back into Dean, enjoying the not-really-a-hug for as long as Dean was willing to stand there radiating heat. "He's sending his grandson by, too. The kid wants to be a traditional hunter, so he needs some weapons." 

Dean nosed at the nape of Sam's neck, and now those shivers of Sam's became goosebumps. "Might not have time for him," he said, voice vibrating low against Sam's skin. "Might have other plans." 

Damn Dean and his timing. Sam tilted his head and stole one hungry kiss, which was all they had time for. "He's already on his way." 

Dean made a grumpy sound and let him go, reaching for the coffee mug with both hands. They stood side by side in front of the sink, drinking coffee and waiting for the knock at the door. 

Jonathan Barnavelt was a tall, scrawny, determined-looking boy of 20. Sam had a moment of awkward recognition when he shook the kid's hand; he'd looked pretty much exactly the same way midway through Stanford. However, he'd already been a seasoned hunter then, and this kid...

"So what'll it be?" Dean asked, gesturing to the table, where the standard array of handguns, pistols, and shotguns was spread out. 

Jonathan stared at them a moment, then reached for a .45 and picked it up with his finger on the trigger. Dean snatched it out of his hand mid-grab. 

"Have you ever handled one of those things before?" Dean demanded. 

"Uh," the kid said, turning red. At least he had the good grace to look embarrassed. 

"What the fuck are you thinking?" Dean grabbed the kid by the hoodie and gave him a shove toward the door. "Pay attention, kid, so you don't blow your goddamned foot off. Or my head."

Two hours of barely patient instruction later, the kid could handle the gun competently and occasionally hit what he was aiming at. He thanked Dean profusely, and Dean gave him an extra box of ammo for the road. 

That night, Sam lay in bed awake while Dean flipped channels restlessly, unable to light on anything. "You know, that kid really needed a teacher," Sam said finally. "You could-"

"Oh, no. Don't you fuckin' start with me, Sammy. The hell do you think I am, some kid's wet nurse?" Dean's thumb pressed the buttons on the remote with vicious fury. 

"We had Dad." Sam leaned closer, let his head fall on Dean's shoulder, where the muscle tensed and released. "Some of these kids, they don't have anyone to tell them. To show them."

"Not my problem." 

"Where would we be if others hadn't helped us?" With one finger, he traced the handprint on Dean's shoulder. 

Dean glared at him and twitched away. He yanked Sam's pillow out from under Sam's head and put it over his own. 

In the morning, Sam padded out to the kitchen to find Dean frying up two slices of bologna in a pan, like when they were kids. The spicy smell brought happy memories flooding back to him: Dean putting sandwiches in his lunch; Dean throwing a football with him after making fried bologna for dinner. Dean popped the puffed pieces of meat onto two plates and slid one in front of Sam. 

"Pour me a Coke and it'll be like we're ten again," Sam said, poking at it with a fork. 

"More for me," Dean said immediately, forking Sam's share onto his plate. 

"Why the nostalgia?" 

Dean ate a couple more bites, then dropped his fork on the plate. "Here's the rules. One at a time, and only if they call ahead. And they need to be old enough to make up their own minds about the business." Dean frowned. "It doesn't feel right otherwise." 

Sam nodded slowly. He picked up his fork and stole a bite of the bologna back from Dean's plate. "So. Spaghetti-O's for lunch?"

"Bitch," muttered Dean, under his breath. 

**

On Dean's fortieth birthday, they killed a troll that had been plaguing families in Ketchum, Idaho. They dragged ass back to a dingy motel room and showered one at a time in a tiny piss-yellow stall. 

"Hey, we should grab burgers and beers," Sam called out to Dean, who was shaving. 

"There's a bar just down the street." Dean pulled the curtain open and gave Sam a long, slow, appreciative leer. "I'm goin' to get a head start. Towel off and come meet me." 

Sam flicked water at him; Dean laughed and let the curtain slide closed, and Sam hurried to finish washing troll bits out of his hair. 

The bar was a standard dive, nothing exciting, acres of garish neon over the front door and respectable-looking drunks milling in and out. Sam stood inside the door for a moment and assessed the room. Three pool tables on one side; jukebox in the corner; long bar down the middle of the room, booths and tables scattered around. 

On first pass, he missed Dean, but then he realized it was because his brother was obscured by girls. A minor cloud of them, actually, glittering butterflies fluttering around Dean, who was eating it up like honey from a spoon. Dean wasn't a young man anymore, but he was still the handsomest man in any room, and women of all ages tripped over themselves trying to get a sliver of his attention. It was always that way, even in backwater Idaho. Maybe especially there. 

Sam laughed quietly to himself and went to the pool tables, aware he was getting his fair share of interested stares from the women, too. Not that it mattered. There was only Dean, now, and despite Dean's attention whoring ways, it was the same for him, Sam knew. 

It was easy to hustle up a game or two, nothing big, just ten buck rounds with the locals. It came back to him, as natural as breathing. Now that they didn't rely on it to support their entire livelihood, it was fun to knock back a beer and immerse himself in the game, chat with the locals about the weather and sports and not care about sucking them in for the kill. 

At the end of his second game, he collected his modest winnings and glanced over at Dean, just to place him, to know he was still there. All the girls had cleared away, leaving Dean alone. His arm was slung across the back of the booth, and he was watching Sam in a way that made Sam's mouth go dry - an intense, unwavering stare that made it clear Sam was his, and there was nothing else in that bar worth looking at. 

Sam took a long swallow of his beer and leaned back against the pool table, waiting. Dean put some bills down on the table, stood, and made his way to the door. Sam smirked and polished off the beer. 

Dean was waiting for him outside, arms folded, one hip braced against the Impala. Sam surrounded him, kissed the breath out of him, practically shoved him in the car. So many years gone by now, and the wanting never stopped, the need for Dean, and the unguarded desire he could see in Dean's eyes was powerful truth. 

At the motel, on a cheap bed like the first time again, they took their time, making out like a couple of teenagers who couldn't get enough of each other. Sam kissed his way down Dean's back, licked the freckles he'd counted a thousand times, hands gentle on Dean the way Dean liked it but would never admit. He fucked Dean slow, deep, watched his eyes for the tells, stopped him from coming a dozen times so it could last, and finally let Dean ride him, soaking in Dean's guttural moans and cries like necessary water. 

In the morning, they made their way home, Sam driving, Dean complaining about being too old and needing a full-body transplant. Sam turned up the radio to drown him out. Dean ate all the Twinkies and threw the empty wrapper in Sam's lap. 

**

Things went on status quo, for a while. They built an addition to the barn, nothing fancy, just a bunkhouse, since the parade of new hunters only seemed to be picking up in pace, not slowing down. Dean wouldn't let them sleep in the barn, paranoia or privacy, hard to tell, but Sam was good with it. Every morning, there was coffee and bacon, and Dean kicking the ends of the bunk beds, shouting for his students to get their lazy asses outta bed. 

Once in a while, things quieted down, and those were the best times of all. 

"Been lookin' at the paper," Dean said, tapping the pen against his teeth. 

"Yeah?" Sam closed the book he was taking notes on. "Find something interesting?"

"Could be. About a dozen people've vanished in Mitchell, Ohio. All of them have turned up with the organs harvested out of their bodies."

"Huh." Sam glanced at his cell. "I could give Marcus Shelton a call, see if he's free."

"Might be our kind of thing." 

"Might be." Sam smiled. "I'll get some stuff together." 

It took about five minutes for them both to pack, another fifteen for Dean to load a cooler and pack the trunk while Sam made coffee and filled a thermos. The old routines, made good again, made right. 

The sun was sinking over the horizon behind them as they set out, Dean at the wheel, the fading sunlight glinting off the silver hair at Dean's temples. Sam poured a cup of coffee for Dean and passed it to him with a smile. He rolled down the window, let the familiar music flow past him and catch on the wind.

In all his life, Sam had never felt so free.


End file.
